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Dec 6, 2012
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well, with 25 days to go until the year-end fiscal cliff deadline, president obama and speaker boehner spoke on the phone yesterday for the first time in days. both men agreed not to publicly characterize how the conversation went. but the stalemate in negotiations entered new territory yesterday with treasury secretary tim geithner suggesting the white house is ready to go off the cliff if republicans refuse to raise taxes on the 2%. >> if republicans do not agree to that, is the administration prepared to go over the fiscal cliff? >> oh, absolutely. again, there's no prospect to an agreement that doesn't involve those rates going up on the top 2% of the wealthiest americans -- remember, it's only 2%. the size of the problem in some sense is so large, it can't be solved without rates going up as part of that. again, i think there's broad recognition of that reality now. >> one fallback option republicans are reportedly considering is to accept tax cuts for the middle class, allow rates to go up for the wealthiest, and then start the fight over again during debt limit talks early next
well, with 25 days to go until the year-end fiscal cliff deadline, president obama and speaker boehner spoke on the phone yesterday for the first time in days. both men agreed not to publicly characterize how the conversation went. but the stalemate in negotiations entered new territory yesterday with treasury secretary tim geithner suggesting the white house is ready to go off the cliff if republicans refuse to raise taxes on the 2%. >> if republicans do not agree to that, is the...
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Nov 30, 2012
11/12
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cliff, this benefits him. the public will blame the republicans. okay. i suppose it's entirely possible. in fact, it's probable of that category. but does obama really want to start the second term going into recession again? the interesting thing, with this offer on the table, sequestration and the expiration of bush tax cuts for everyone is the best option for republicans right now. but as least under that, you can dispel this notion -- the biggest obstacle is this attitude of the public that we can solve the problem of the debt, we can solve the problem of entitlements just by raising taxes on the rich a little bit. it's fundamentally not true. but my attitude to say all right, fine, let's go with that. let's even go with tax increases for everybody. even that bottom bracket going up from 10% to 15%. let the bush tax cuts -- if they must expire, let them expire for everybody. and then we'll see how far tax increases can take us in dealing with these problems. and the answer is not that far at all. >> not th
cliff, this benefits him. the public will blame the republicans. okay. i suppose it's entirely possible. in fact, it's probable of that category. but does obama really want to start the second term going into recession again? the interesting thing, with this offer on the table, sequestration and the expiration of bush tax cuts for everyone is the best option for republicans right now. but as least under that, you can dispel this notion -- the biggest obstacle is this attitude of the public that...
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Dec 3, 2012
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tea party 2 is going to dwarf tea party 1 if obama pushes us off the cliff. >> so basically, jon, what grover norquist is saying there to members of the tea party set who have been elected, who were elected, is, you know, we're going to take everybody who is against us into a primary on your right. >> right. >> on the republican side. >> right. >> so the threat has been issued already, even before we begin negotiating what the package will be. >> oh, yeah. >> this is like political terrorism. >> well, it's certainly a clear bargaining position. i remember three years ago talking to a longtime member of the house who was running for the senate. and we were talking about something else. and at the end of the conversation, i said, is it really as bad as everybody says? is it worse than when you came in? which was in the late '80s. and he said the central difference is in the caucus, the republican caucus, the fear is not a democratic challenge, it's a primary challenge. and it's the first time i had ever heard the term "to be primaried." he said, "you don't want to be primaried." you can
tea party 2 is going to dwarf tea party 1 if obama pushes us off the cliff. >> so basically, jon, what grover norquist is saying there to members of the tea party set who have been elected, who were elected, is, you know, we're going to take everybody who is against us into a primary on your right. >> right. >> on the republican side. >> right. >> so the threat has been issued already, even before we begin negotiating what the package will be. >> oh, yeah....
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Dec 7, 2012
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if obama remains intransigent, let him be the one to take us over the cliff, and then let the new house, which is sworn in weeks before the president, immediately introduce and pass a full across-the-board restoration of the george w. bush tax cuts. >> so i don't think that's inconsistent with anything that i just said. i agree with him 100%. what have i been saying for a week? do not cave. compromise. do not cave. if the president doesn't want to meet us halfway on massive entitlement cuts, on reforming those systems to save medicare and medicaid, social security, cutting defense, reforming the taxes, then do not meet -- if he doesn't want to meet halfway, but i've got to tell you, i am heartened with what i saw in the president's tone yesterday. i loved hearing him tell a group of americans yesterday, hey, we're going to get this thing done. i feel good about it. i love that he agreed to sit down with john boehner one on one. richard, you've done negotiations on all levels. i really liked the tone the president was sending. and by the way, i felt like charles krauthammer did a couple
if obama remains intransigent, let him be the one to take us over the cliff, and then let the new house, which is sworn in weeks before the president, immediately introduce and pass a full across-the-board restoration of the george w. bush tax cuts. >> so i don't think that's inconsistent with anything that i just said. i agree with him 100%. what have i been saying for a week? do not cave. compromise. do not cave. if the president doesn't want to meet us halfway on massive entitlement...
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Dec 5, 2012
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, which is no deal without some increase in rates, or we go over the cliff. >> let me just add one thing. when obama made that initial offer, we talked a little bit about how, you know, it was a wish list. it was ideological, whatever you want to say. i think it actually helped boehner in some respects because it gave him three or four things that he could then go back to his caucus and say, look, i moved obama off of this, this and this. and when boehner put his offer out there, you started to see what could potentially be a chip-trading process going on here, whereby you have some give on, you know, cpi, the inflation index for social security, and in exchange boehner would agree to some marginal rate in the tax rates. now the people need to start figuring out what they want to give and take. >> the only difference i would say, steve, between what the president wants and john boehner is it's not what john boehner wants. it's what john boehner can deliver. >> yeah. >> and this is a simple vote-counting measure. in his first interview since the election, president obama reiterated his de
, which is no deal without some increase in rates, or we go over the cliff. >> let me just add one thing. when obama made that initial offer, we talked a little bit about how, you know, it was a wish list. it was ideological, whatever you want to say. i think it actually helped boehner in some respects because it gave him three or four things that he could then go back to his caucus and say, look, i moved obama off of this, this and this. and when boehner put his offer out there, you...